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New threats emerge to endanger the future of the Seven Kingdoms, as Daenerys Targaryen, ruling in the East, fights off a multitude of enemies, while Jon Snow, Lord Commander of the Night's Watch, faces his foes both in the Watch and beyond the great Wallof ice and stone.

At first I thought this book was going to be cliff-hanger after cliff-hanger, with no story progression. I was wrong. The story moves wonderfully and sets things up so well for the next book. I really enjoyed it from beginning to end. If you are a fan of the series this book will not disappoint. ( )

Soooooooooooo much better than the last one OMG. I couldn't tell you if it's objectively a good book, but it held my attention pretty much the entire time, and a TON of stuff happened. Now I guess I have to wait years for the next one. Dammit. ( )

The only thing that it seems happened in this book was people traveling, which annoyingly reminded me of the previous book in the series. The entire time, I waited for fun and exciting things to begin happening since I had already paid the price of reading book #4 (basically a filler book). Right? It was ironically the same feeling I had before. I pretty much hate this book. Only bad things happen to characters I like and several characters are left hanging dry as if I would commit to another sequel to read the answers. Uh, no. That's what this book was supposed to be. When I thought exciting things were just around the corner, the next page said "Epilogue" at the top. I was annoyed most of the book hoping for character stories to get fulfilled, and at the end it was more like anger as if my time had been betrayed. Sure, there is a setup for a sequel, but I already read through like 2,000 pages of what felt like PRETENSE! I'm done.

It's terrible. Martin has taken the concept of the pot-boiler to an extreme — it's a novel where nothing happens other than continual seething, roiling turmoil. He whipsaws the reader through a dozen different, complex story lines where characters struggle to survive in a world wrecked by civil war — one other problem is that I'd hit a chapter about some minor character from the previous four books, and struggled to remember who the heck this person is, and why I'm supposed to care — and again, nothing is resolved. Well, not quite: major characters are brutally killed, if they're male, and graphically and degradingly humiliated into irrelevance if they're female. I guess that's a resolution, all right — perhaps the last book will be a lovingly detailed description of a graveyard, draped with naked women mourning?

Martin remains boundlessly creative, sketching out intricately realized new civilizations, societies, religions, and factions on one continent while continuing to complicate the established political agendas on another. No part of his world ever feels like an afterthought or an easy fantasy cliché.

"Soon comes the pale mare, and after her the others. Kraken and dark flame, lion and griffin, the sun's son and the mummer's dragon. Trust none of them. Remember the Undying. Beware the perfumed seneschal."

"A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies .... The man who never reads lives only one."

Women do not forget. Women do not forgive.

Give me priests who are fat and corrupt and cynical ... the sort who like to sit on soft satin cushions, nibble sweetmeats, and diddle little boys. It's the ones who believe in gods who make the trouble.